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Filmy Ripples- Exotic Instruments in Film music – Part 5 (Final)

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By P.V. Gopalakrishnan

In this concluding part on Exotic Instruments in Film Music I wish to share some of my thoughts on our classic numbers in Tamil Film Music from the bygone era, listening to which we get transported back to relive the past!

They make us visualize the mammoth orchestra that went with the recording of many of the classic songs. This in turn trigger our thoughts on those times when these melodies were made. By any count, people mostly agree that these oldies from the world of Indian Film music are indeed a treasure.  The melodies of these songs are as fresh as the morning breeze to us forever. Added to them, the fine lyrics & clear diction of the singers make them so memorable.

This writer has had, during his prime days, the opportunity of witnessing few song recordings, thanks to a peer with connections! Those days were prior to the advent of stereo. The musicians were so cramped in a small recording room. Often the instruments they played on, per se, were hugely cumbersome, whether it is Univox, Double Base, Vibraphone, Piano, Cello, Kettle Drum or Harp. The air-conditioning was mostly absent as they wanted to be free from the noise of room air-conditioners & the central cooling system was not in vogue then. Imagine these very classic melodies, that were made in such less friendly environs, are being crooned out over stereophonic mikes with mixing facilities by today’s participants of TV Reality & stage shows, in the air-conditioned comfort. Whereas those men who played this music in perfect harmony, recorded them so truly sweating them out.

Those were the days, not blessed with digital sound technology. Nor were sound files & bytes known. The recordings were done the hard way. Thanks to the non-advent of track recording, the singers were in full human form & feeling the real music emanating from physically played instruments by a swarm of musicians. This meant a lot of understanding, respect & harmony between the singers & the players. The real human side of the collective music, if you like.

The music so generated also had passion in its roots having been delivered by talented musicians in real time recording situations. These unplugged sounds of the music were pure & original from each instrument, whether wind, brass, string or percussion. These great melodies were captured by “shure” mikes of mono format & made captive in vinyl record discs of those times, in the avatar of LPs & EPs. There were no computer generated beats, no octopus pads & no synthesizers, which today form, at best, poor imitations of the reverberations of the original instruments.

Some of the legends of sixties in the Tamil film music world included doyens like Sabesan (pianist), Raju (mandolin), Henry Daniel (trumpetist), Sudarsanam (flute), Philip (guitarist), Mangalamurthy (accordian), Hanumanthayya (tabla), who were all over the immortal compositions of the duo Viswanathan – Ramamoorthy. These guys were behind each of the old time melodies & many of them have left this world since leaving a huge vacuum!

With limited medium of entertainment (TVs, other recorded devices made advent much later) all ears were glued to those radio sets listening to Radio Ceylon and these musicians lived up to the responsibility of delivering the sole audio entertainment of those days. And they did it with aplomb, in unmatched quality!

Listening to these old melodies bring you nostalgia, laced with a tint of sadness of having lost those days forever in one’s life! A sadness of a like which is as soothing as weeping!!

But, it is unfortunate that these classic film musicians did not directly see themselves in limelight & withered away unacknowledged largely, though Groups like MSV Times bring honor to some of them either live or posthumously.

Now on to discuss the individual musical instruments that played in well known songs.

Dholak is a double sided folk drum, usually played with both hands while positioned on the player’s lap while an iron thumb ring is used to produce a distinctive rim sound as rhythm.

In many old Tamil songs, one used to hear Dholak beats and here is ‘Ullathile uram vendumada’ rendered by A.M.Raja from Vijayapuri Veeran, composed by T.R.Paappa, for your listening pleasure. (1960)

The beautiful duet, ‘Anbu manam kanindha pinne’ (Aalukkoru veedu -1960 Film) too has Dholak percussion through the song.

‘Dafli’, as it is called in Hindi, is a Tambourine, denoting an instrument with a large circular drumhead, on which skin membrane is stretched over the playing area. In Tamil, it is colloquially known as ‘Tape’. In Hindi a full film called ‘Sargam’ was dedicated to it, with Rishi Kapoor as a Dafli player. Here is a popular Tamil song, ‘Ellorum kondaduvom’ by TMS from ‘Pava Mannippu’, composed by MSV-TKR.

The Western Drum Set has also been often used in Indian film music. Here is an instance of its deployment in ‘Kannirendum minna minna’ from ‘Andavan Kattalai’, rendered by P.B.Srinivas & L.R.Easwari. The composers MSV-TKR have used it along with Piano Chords through the song. Mr. Noel Grant was the ace drummer who worked in the orchestra of MSV-TKR.

Snare Drum, which is part of the main Drum Set, is played by striking it with either a drum stick or any other form of beater, including brushes which produce a softer-sounding vibration from the snare wires. Our composers have used Snare Drums in many songs. Here we can hear it in the song ‘Sugam…sugam’ from the film ‘Thangai’  (1967) composed by MSV.

Ghatam is an instrument used in carnatic stream of music & is one of the most ancient percussion instruments of South India. It is a clay pot with a narrow mouth. From where, it slants outwards to form a ridge. Made mainly in Manamadurai (Tamil Nadu) & Devanahalli (Karnataka), of clay with with brass or copper filings along with a small amount of iron filings, it’s a fixed pitched instrument.  It has been made international by the Ghatam Wizard ‘Vikku’ Vinayakaram, who holds even a Grammy Award.

‘Azhagana Ratchasiye’ composed by A.R.Rahmam for the film ‘Muthalvan’ has ample usage of Ghatam. Dr.Karthick has played ghatam for A.R.Rahman in some of his compositions.

Veena is an instrument that relates to historical past, which is used in Carnatic stream. However, artistes like Chittibabu, Parthasarathi & Rajesh Vaidya have done some excellent work, playing for various composers in Tamil films.

We cite here two Tamil film melodies featuring Veena, ‘Sonna sollai nee’ by M.S. Rajeswari, from ‘PeNN’ composed by Sudarsanam & ‘Deviyar iruvar’ from ‘Kalai Koil’ composed by MSV-TKR. The latter film featured copious Veena notes in its songs as well as BGM, as the Hero was shown as a Veena artiste. These were played by the late Veteran Chittibabu, whose disciple is Rajesh Vaidya.

Kalai Koil

Song book of Kalai Koil with the page containing the song DEVIYAR IRUVAR PC: From the archives of TCRC

 

 

Gottu Vadhyam aka Chithra Veena is another traditional string instrument of great antiquity, popular with Carnatic music. This stringed instrument which resembles a Veena, is played by a slide just like a Hawaiian Guitar. Dr. Ravikiran is a well known exponent of the same. There have been few songs using this instrument. The Malayalam song ‘Senthar mizhi’ from ‘Perumazhakalam’, composed by M.Jayachandran features Gottu Vadhyam strains along with Ghatam beats, very creatively.

Piano too has been abundantly used in our films, particularly in South by MSV-TKR. MSV himself was very good at playing Piano. ‘Brindavanamum Nandakumaranum’ (Missiyamma), ‘Pattunro kaetten’ (Pasamalar), ‘Paaduvor padinaal’ (Kannan en kadhalan), Unnai onru ketpen, (Puthiya Paravai) Kannirendum minna minna (Andavan Kattalai), Ellorum nalam vazha (Enga Mama), Enna enna varthaigalo (Vennira Aadai) , Manithan enbavan (Sumai Thangi) , Kannenna Kannenna kalanguthu (Periya idathu peNN).

Vennira adai

Song book of Vennira Aadai with the page containing the song ENNA ENNA VARTHAIGALO  PC: From the archives of TCRC

‘Glockenspiel’ aka ‘bells, as is commonly referred to, is an instrument of German origin, having metal plates or tubes as ‘keys’ and are played by striking upon with hard tippled mallets, thus making it a metallophone. Our South Indian Composers have often used it in their songs, especially MSV-TKR duo. Listen to ‘Muthukkalo kangal’ (Nenjirukkumvarai) or ‘Thookkam kangalai’ (Alayamani) where this instrument makes very delectable notes.

Here is Harry Potter theme played on a Glockenspiel.

Vibraphone is a larger version of a ‘bells’ and has deep resonance of the notes produced which have a tremolo effect. The following video gives an idea of this instruments & its way of playing.

There are plenty of Tamil film songs where they have used this instrument. Here is an instance where Vibraphone has been used, the song being ‘Varathiruppano’ (Pachai Vilakku), rendered by P.Suseela in the composition of MSV-TKR.

 

Pachai Vilakku

Song book of Pachai Vilakku with the page containing the song VARATHIRUPPANO PC: From the archives of TCRC

 

 

 

 

Filmy Ripples – Cars that added glitter to movies

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By P V Gopalakrishnan

Vintage & classic cars are the cherished dreams of car enthusiasts & collectors worldwide, but have been routinely dubbed as ‘ottai’ car in the average common man’s lingo, where the Tamil word ‘ottai’ refers to a ramshackle one. As such we have not given enough attention to those timeless beauties, which had featured in our own old films, though they roamed the streets of this planet with great name & fame, at some points in time.

In Hollywood, there are specialized companies that provide the rentals of cars from a collection of older vehicles or broker the rental of privately owned vehicles to production companies. A vintage car owner can list his car with one or more of these companies that provide classic cars to the Film industry in USA. They call the owner when a need for his car arises.

Who can forget those cute Mini Coopers that appeared in ‘The Italian Job’?

As for Indian films, there are no catalogued sources of supply of old cars to films as Props. Therefore, the supply sources must be from various sources that are often gray.

The following 1958 Model Chevrolet Impala Convertible featured in the film ‘Karagattakaran’ along with the team of Kaundamani & Ramarajan.

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The Dodge Kingsway which appeared in the Malayalam Movie ‘in Ghost House Inn” (2010).

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The following stills from Kamal Hassan’s ‘Hey Ram’ feature two of the exotic cars of yester years used in that period movie.

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A Ford Super Deluxe Model of the Forties featured in Tamil movie ‘Paiyya’.

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The viewing of any old film that features cars gives us a peek of some of the lovely classic vintage beauties that the automobile world have had. Whether it is the Hero flaunting his car to his lady love or a group of spoiled brats roaming in a classic car or it is a hot chase scene or even a emotion filled scene with a car part of the scene, the Dodges, Desotos, Camaros, Plymouths, Pontiacs, Impalas, Studebakers, Oldsmobiles, Fords, Hillmans, Chevrolets, Morris Minors, Austins & Vauxhalls have had omnipresence on our silver screens.

Here is a scene from Sabapathy (1941), where T.R.Ramachandran rode a Morris 8 Cabriolet along with his consort, T.R.Padma, who was then the Brand Ambassador for Lux Beauty Soap, singing “Kadhal Vegam”.

Those days filming a moving car posed a lot of technical difficulties. As such, some long shots were used of the car in motion inter-cut with tight close ups of the artistes seated in the car. Some close ups of the car with the actors involved a stationery car being shaken manually as the actor in driver’s seat turned the steering wheel, while the back projection of trees moving in reverse direction added to reality.

Here is a song ‘Kada kada loda loda vandi’ from Samsaram (1951), music by Emani Sankara Sastry, filmed in a sequence where the automobile borne lady Vanaja & her sidekicks boo the bullock cart man Sriram.

Taking a romantic drive with a song, ‘Jagamathil inbam’ on their lips are T.R.Mahalingam & S.Varalakshmi in the movie ‘Mohana Sundaram’ (1951).

In the off screen song sequence from the movie ‘Yaar paiyan’ (1957), a emotion choked Gemini Ganesan transports the young Daisy Irani in his classic Fiat to abandon the child, despite his mind calling his action grossly unfair.

A break free Gemini Ganesan drives his classic vehicle around the town singing ‘Minor life romba jolly’ in the film ‘Illarame nallaram’ (1958).

The romance was in the air as Gemini Ganesan drove this beautiful Buick with his consort Savithri on the winding roads of a Hill Station in the film ‘Pasa malar’ (1961).

Now, let us Look at Sivaji Ganesan & friends expressing their ‘vagabondism’ in ‘Nichaya Thamboolam’ (1962) in the song ‘Andavan Padachan’ as they move about in their limousine.

In another boy meets girl episode, Muthuraman & Kanchana sing & dance in the then pristine Marina of the sixties from the iconic comedy film ‘Kathalikka naeramillai’ (1964). In this duet melody, ‘Enna parvai unthan parvai’, the pair drive off in a ship long luxury car, which once belonged to Padma Sri. Jothi Venkatachalam.

In the same movie, in a chivalrous situation in the song “Unga ponnana kaigal punnagalama’, Ravichandran teases the sisters Kanchana & Rajasree as he helps them inflate their the tyres of their Standard Herald car, before driving away in his Austin.

The Gemini produced ‘Motor Sundaram Pillai’ (1966)  featured Sivaji Ganesan driving what seems to be a real vintage & iconic T – Model Ford.

Motor Sundaram Pillai

An Ad for Motor Sundaram from Naradar dated 15.11.1965 PC: From the archives of TCRC

In the comedy film ‘Sadhu Mirandal’ (1966), Comedian Nagesh drove, as a Taxi Driver character, a 1947 Model Chevy Fleetmaster throughout the movie. Such cars were running in the streets of Madras till the sixties, as a left over legacy of British Raj. Those days, in the front parking bay of Madras Central Station you could witness a sea of such huge imported cars, bearing yellow & black colours.

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An Ad for Sadhu Miranda from Naradar dated 01.12.1965 PC: from the archives of TCRC

The song ‘Azhagirukkuthu ulagile’ from the film ‘Anubhavi Raja Anubhavi’ (1967) has Muthuraman & Nagesh frolicking around in their car.

Sivaji Ganesan takes his wards on a city tour in his jalopy in the film ‘Enga Mama’  (1970)  with a song ‘Nan thannam thani kattu raja’.

Contrast to the old techniques of filming car sequences, today the technology of lighting & camera has so much become advanced that filming the interior of a moving vehicle is relatively a cake walk. The following still shows the filming of car scenes in ‘Pannaiyarum Padminiyum’

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The modern filming techniques of a car involve strapping the cinematographer in front of the moving vehicle as he operates his camera gliding on a railing back & forth from the bonnet side to side door windows.

In India, private owners parade classic cars in rallies conducted locally. Otherwise certain private collectors from the super rich and erstwhile royal families have them. However, the authentic supply of classic cars in India is not known by any documented & reliable source.

It is not as if we are in a country like Cuba where one could take a step back into automotive time, as Havana is rife with classic cars moving about its streets, literally, making Cuba a rolling car museum, thanks to the four-decade-long grudge the late Fidel Castro held against the United States, placing a ban on foreign vehicle imports.

As such the films do appease the vintage auto lovers by featuring them now & then in their productions.

 

Filmy Ripples – Fifty Shades of Lullaby

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By P V Gopalakrishnan

A Lullaby, as per Cambridge dictionary, is “a quiet song that is sung to children to help them go to sleep”. Indeed, a down-to-earth meaning, as we commonly perceive them to be. It is said that when babies are disturbed by sudden movements or noises, their blood pressure and heartbeats shoot up instantly when a Lullaby could draw the disturbed child back to normalcy by calming them, in a jiffy. So, it is music therapy that is engrained in lullaby.

Ancient literatures have lullabies in them. Sages and ascetics have sung what are known as ‘PiLLai Thamizh’ in Tamil literature on Celestial Entities. Bhakthi has found its apt expression in the lullaby composition, ‘Mannu pugazh Kosalai thum mani vayiru vaaythavane’ on Lord Rama, by Kula Sekara Azwar.

The poignant lullaby “Omanathingal Kidavo”, had been composed by the famous Malayalam poet Iravi Varman Thampi as lullaby for the young Swathi Thirunal, strikes a tender chord as its soothing notes have lulled generations of children asleep.

Rhythmic usage of words like ‘Aararo’ and ‘thalelo’ are used in ancient Tamil lullabies, typically. Grannies used to twirl their tongue making phonetics to sound like ‘loLa loLa loLa aayeee’ to calm the child.

Lullabies are a part of the cultural legacy of humanity and they have always found a place, rightfully, in films.

The filmy lullaby has had even the proud history of being nominated to Oscar, with the Tamil lullaby, composed and sung by the popular Carnatic vocalist Bombay Jayashri in the Hollywood film ‘Life of Pi’ going for Oscar nomination!

 

 

Traditionally, Raga Neelambari is associated with lullabies. However, movie lullabies follow a freelance pattern and do not restrict only to Neelambari. The movie lullabies are set to soft music using music instruments such as pipo-fone, piano, flutes, sitar, bells, vibrafone etc. that produce baby friendly sounds, attributable to sleep mode. Listen to this beautiful Hindi lullaby, based on a Bengali tune, from ‘Sujata’.

 

Our own cinemas have featured many a lullaby, with various underlying emotions of the character that renders the lullaby song on screen. But the situations in which these lullabies were included in films had their own unique connotations, some sorrowful, some wishful about posterity, some tickling funny bones, some inspirational and some comical.

There have been innumerable lullabies on our Tamil screen & this writer could enlist about thirty of them in this write up, discussing some of them.

It is commonplace for a mother to sing a lullaby to her offspring, which is full of positive things as the child grows. She packs her natural love & affection into it that it is a form of maternal blessing, so to say, to the child, as it tries to catch forty winks.

The memorable songs in this ‘love & affection’ category include ‘Anbil malarntha nal roja’ (Kanavane Kan Kanda Deivam), ‘Kanne vanna pasunkiliye’ (Yanai valartha vanampadi), ‘Kannin maniye vaa’ (Valliyin Selvan), ‘Poonchittu kannangal’ (Thulabaram), ‘Thenral vandhu veesadho’ (Sivagangai Seemai), ‘Velli nila mutrathile’ (Vettaikaran) featuring either of the parents of the child, in the filmed sequence as rendering the lullaby.

The below video is of a beautiful lullaby from ‘Kanavane Kan Kanda Deivam’ (1955), filmed on Anjali Devi, was in the music score of Hemant Kumar & the singer was P.Suseela. The music arrangement is simple with violins & guitar as main instruments.

 

 

Another beautiful lullaby of classical base, whose video is below, ‘Kannin maniye vaa’ rendered by M.L.Vasanthakumari in ‘Valliyin Kanavan’ (1955) in the music of P.S.Anantharaman, has been filmed on a lactating mother, enacted by M.S.Sundari Bai.

 

 

Another very melodious lullaby rendered by twin singers, S.Varalakshmi & T.S.Bhagavathy, is in the following video. The moving music, full of classical flute notes, was by MSV-TKR from the Kannadasan produced ‘Sivagangai Seemai’ (1959).

 

 

A fatherly lullaby can be heard in the following video, filmed MGR. T.M.Sounderrajan has rendered it very movingly in the melodious soft music of K.V.Mahadevan from the film ‘Vettaikaran’.

 

 

Sometimes, the lullaby incorporates situational advice to cajole a crying child as was in the famous film lullaby ‘Chinna pappa enga chella pappa’ (Vanna KiLi), where the mother tries to administer normalcy in an otherwise tense situation.

 

 

Often the lullabies also have an intense reflection of pathos & suffering, as are reflected in Blues genre of Western Music. We may cite such songs in the examples of ‘Konju mozhi sollum kiLiye’ (Parasakthi), ‘Malarnthum malaratha’ (Pasa Malar).

 

 

There are also lullabies incorporating tinges of inspirational messages, as was in ‘Kaala magaL kaN thirappaL’ (Ananda Jothi), as the character played by Devika sang to the then child star Kamal Hassan.

 

 

Even in comedy situations films have featured a lullaby genre of songs, an example of which could be the parody number, ‘Appappa naan appan allada’ (Galatta Kalyanam), where the situation demands Sivaji Ganesan to bring home & tend a baby! The way he dances about the baby, it must have given colic pain to the bay! Then in the same comedy flavor was another lullaby ‘Budhi sigamani petha pullai (Iruvar Ullam), unusually filmed on M.R.Radha.

 

In stark contrast, there could be situations of utter frustration & sadness triggering a lullaby as in the famous  ‘Ean piranthay magane’ (Baga Pirivinai), where the handicapped hero laments about a son being born to him in the unfortunate ambience and ’Poo maalai puzhuthi maN mele’ (Parasakthi).

 

 

 

Of course, utter proudness & exuberance do not deter a parent from singing a lullaby, instances of which are too many in our films. ‘Athai madi methaiyadi’ from Karpagam, ‘Chella Kiligalam’ (Enga Mama) (it was a mass lullaby for a group of children under the hero’s mentorship), ‘Min miniyai kanmaniyay’ (Kannan en kadhalan), ‘Naan petra selvam from the movie of same title, ‘Nee sirithal naan sirippen’ (Pavai ViLakku), ‘Pachai maram onru’ (Ramu) are all classic instances.

 

 

When you listen to ‘Chellakiliye mella pesu’ (Petralthaan pillaiya), off screen, it is a perfect lullaby of melancholic strains. But when you see the visuals MGR has enacted the song totally in a happy situation.

 

 

The other reflectively rendered slow paced Tamil film lullabies are ‘Neela vanna kanna vada’ (Mangayar Thilakam), ‘Chinnanchiru kanmalar’ (Pathi Bakthi), ‘Araaro nee yararo’ (Rajamukthi), ‘Eazhu malai andavane’ (Kalyanam panni paar), ‘Ellorum unnai nallavan enre’ (Bagyavathi), ‘Kalamithu kalamithu kannunurangu’ (Chithi), ‘Kanne Kamala poo’ (Periya Koil), ‘Kannan Varuvan’ (Panchavarnakili), ‘Kanne Raja kavalai vendam’ (Bagyalakshmi), ‘Mannukku maram barama’ (Thai piranthal vazhi pirakkum), ‘Ore oru oorile’ (Padikkatha medhai) & ‘Pillaikku thanthai oruvan’ (Parthal pasi theerum).

 

 

 

The opportunity of watching a lullaby sequence in a film has greatly diminished these days & it could even become extinct some day, as the trend of movies have departed from the film subjects of the bygone days..

But the music directors of different times have gifted us with beautiful lullaby songs that enhance our listening pleasures, even today. We will cherish them forever, for sure!